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Full rules|Why?

Clonetard City: Turn Twenty . And so it ends. . Your typical mecha-on-mecha engagement will usually end with some machines scrapped, some crippled, and some retreated. This one is no different.
There's a term for it: "combat loss grouping". It can mean two things; one, is the point where both sides have taken damage so that several machines can be expected to fall in quick succession. Two: the point where a combat force has taken sufficient damage that they cannot be expected to succeed at their objective, and it's more practical to withdraw the surviving assets than to continue fighting.
Finn: shot at ThunderTOD. Miss.
ThunderTOD: didn't send any orders, so I figured I'd have him shoot at Smith. Hit, technically, but he had partial cover and it was a leg hit, so it ripped up the hill instead.
Smith: lightly damaged the internal structure of Bob's leg.
Bob: decided to trot off the board.
VI infantry: wanted to chase Bob.
------------------------------------------------------------------
Map of starting positions:
Map of ending positions:
------------------------------------------------------------------
Here's the main group:
Now public subgroups:
Moffatt's Marauders
The 217th Varion Invaders
Surviving units:
VI:
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/caracal.png
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/caracal_se.png
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/cheetah.png
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/specterct.png
MM:
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/bansheed.png
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/t5.png
http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/azazaza/TBFCC/Roundtwenty/wraith.png
So, the mistakes: both sides had some pretty big ones. The major one was not engaging properly; they both tried to rush into a melee, after a lengthy period of waiting to see what the other side would do. For the Invaders, their next mistake was not supporting the Chimera in its charge; for the Marauders, their mistake was not concentrating fire to bring it down quickly.
After that: well, the Wraith, by all accounts, should have been grievously mauled after rushing up to Finn. That it isn't is a testament to sheer blind luck.
The Caracals should have staggered their fire to minimize heat buildup and maximize firepower; although that's a semi-advanced tactic that can't really be expected from new players.
The Banshees should have stayed at long range: the fact is, a Banshee's twin AC/5s are nowhere near as powerful (5 points of damage) as a Caracal's twin Large Lasers/Lazors (8 points of damage) but have longer range and nearly no heat buildup. The Banshees, being faster and more agile, could have dealt considerable harrassing damage before the Caracals closed; ideally, the Malefactor would have been in the middle to keep them busy.
On the Invaders side, again, the scout cars existed for a reason: harrassing fire. 3 points of damage isn't much, but it adds up, especially since when you're the focus of a mecha charge with missile support you've got more important things to do than pick off fast-moving, hard to hit scout vehicles. Same for the Specter. The Archer, well, not much wrong there; could've standed to move more, but that'd kick up its to-hits; accuracy or safety, that's the tradeoff. Speed is life, but it's hard to shoot while moving over uneven terrain at maximum speed.
The infantry: could have taken a much more active role in things with little risk to themselves. The most dangerous opponents for them were the tanks and Wraith; machineguns, flamers and inferno missiles are about all an infantry unit has to worry about in this. They had rifles with a three-square range; nothing was stopping them from taking potshots (except that I forgot to mention weapon ranges and damage) at the enemy. As for swarming; yeah, it's deadly, but planting satchel charges in the leg joints can be better. Sometimes. Really, with infantry, constricted terrain is both life and death; A: if you're in it, you're harder to get at, but B: if you're in it, the enemy can probably kill you at will while your supporting units can't get a bead on them.
Regarding Finn going for the high ground and what looked like a flanking manuever: not bad, really. It all turned to custard when Bob broiled his gyro, though; I wouldn't want to risk running with a damaged gyro, and neither did Finn by the looks of it. Still managed to do a lot of damage, though, but I'm going to mention something: you know how it took him so much effort to get up? That's because a damaged gyro makes it much harder to pilot a machine. If someone had kicked him, he'd probably have fallen over again, much in the fashion of a skittle.
The tank: bad luck, there. Spaz could've done a frakkalot of damage, if he'd gotten a chance to open up with that big-bore cannon of his; it was, discounting kicks and that sword, the single highest damage output weapon in this match, and with a tank's immunity to heat buildup and his massive ammo bin, he could've merrily fired it 'till the cows came home. Quite literally, too: he had 20 turns worth of ammo. The game went on for 20 turns. Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a- BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM
From a tactical point of view, things could've gone much better. On the other hand, people had fun anyway, and that's the important thing.
Here's some helpful info pages to help you bone up on things before the next game (which, as a note, will be you guyz VS us guyz, with "Us Guyz" being played by the Areetsa Institute For Zellbrigen Related Hard Knocks, and "You Guyz" being played by, well, You Guyz.), and a link to a java based version of the original game which this is based on.
If you want the original rules:
http://www.classicbattletech.com/index.php?action=products&mode=full&id=179
(Don't worry, it's free)
A couple of handy guides:
http://www.sarna.net/files/docs/guides/
Java port of the game:
http://megamek.info/
(A note, though: in this, you can always shoot in a 360 degree angle. This is because "real" 'mechs can both torso twist and move their arms, but my lego mechae can't. Not all of them, anyway. So I fudge some rules, and throw out some others. I also frakked with movement rates, to-hit modifiers, and, slightly, weapon damage and range. That's because they're fine on a big map, but I don't have the parts for a larger map so I had to shorten ranges to fit on the squares. It works reasonably well, though, and ranges are still comparable. Medium lasers and AC/20s are outranged by Large lasers, which are outranged by PPCs. Don't know what a PPC or AC/20 is? Don't worry, you'll find out soon enough. Of course, you'll get some fun new toys as well, including the "real", less stinky versions of the Caracal and Banshee. The Caracal was deliberately crippled to teach heat management and make the Banshee less of a stupid idea, and the Banshee could've been much more lethal with a missile launcher instead of one cannon. Longer range, more damage. And C.A.S.E.. It'll be clear to you, after a little bit of fruitless searching, that the mechae in Clonetard City are non-canon designs; that is, they're not from Battletech. Some of them are based on canon machines, but not all.)
Well, hope you all enjoyed yourselves.
Me, it's 4 in the morning and I need this thing they call "sleep".